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My first dabble with strength training was far from a pretty site. I remember it like it was yesterday, I only lasted 3 weeks.

Back in the day when I first started learning about strength training I was reading stuff about Louie Simmons and his Westside Barbell program and Joe Defranco with his WS4SB program.

These two resources were my staples when I first started out. I must have reread the articles 20 times each. Some of it was making sense, but there was a particular part that I wasn’t fully grasping.

It wasn’t until a couple of years later when I realized where I went wrong.

I truly believe that most people that are dipping their toes in the waters of strength training might have the same confusion I had.

So today I want to address this confusion in hopes that it might help you have a better understanding on how to:

Properly Warm up for a strength training workout

Now I’m not talking about the dynamic warm up that you should already be doing before even touching a weight.

I’m talking about the warm up that you NEED to do with the movement/exercise you’re about to perform.

So not to drift away from the point of this article, but just in case you’re new to weight lifting, every workout should start with a compound movement like the deadlift, squat, bench press, and overhead press. 

In order for you to perform these compound movements with good mechanics, you need to properly warm your muscles, joints, and central nervous system up so you can get the full benefit of the exercise.

So how do you properly warm up? 

You need to perform the compound exercise of the day in sets of low reps.

This is where I went wrong back in the day. 

The articles I read were saying to warm up using low reps. So using sets of 5 reps and below was recommended if the goal was to warm the body up for heavy lifting. 

Well being a noobie I thought since I was supposed to perform low reps I was supposed to do it with heavy weight. Which you are but NOT for your warm up sets.

See what I didn’t understand at the time was that the warm up for the compound movement was to be performed using low reps while increasing the weight in increments that you feel comfortable with (it can be 5, 10, 20, 30, even 50 pounds). The reason is because you’re not trying to fatigue the muscles.

All you’re trying to do is prepare the body for the heavy weight that’s to come. 

So you perform the deadlift or squat and increase the weight until you reach the poundage that allows you to perform whatever rep scheme you have prescribed.

This is the best way to go about lifting heavy.

Unfortunately what most people do is warm up using 10 rep sets. All this does is exhaust the muscle group your using to the point where you won’t be able to lift the amount of weight your body’s actually capable of.


Now there is a time and place where you want to exhaust the muscle before a compound movement. I recently read an article by Sean Hyson where he talks about pushing compound movements towards the end of the workout.

The reason for switching it up is to avoid over stressing your body. As someone who has been lifting for over a decade, I completely understand and agree with Sean.

If you’ve been in the iron game for a long time you definitely have developed some wear and tear around your body. It’s just the way it is. You can’t really avoid it as a weight lifter.

You can make the wear and tear less impactful by lifting properly and having a well-programmed workout routine but you can’t fully get rid of the damage your body takes from lifting heavy weights.


Now I hope you read that above because all of that is directed to lifters who have been in the iron game for a while.

For you newcomers (beginners), your body’s fresh and new. You can add a little more stress to your body without worrying about an injury occurring.

So exhausting your muscles before performing your compound movement is not in your best interest. If you want to truly get the full benefit of strength training you need to teach your body to recruit new muscle fibers in a more efficient way in order to lift heavier.

Each week your body should be stimulated with heavier weight (unless you’re an advanced lifter, that’s a whole different ball game).

I wouldn’t even consider myself an advanced lifter, and I’ve been lifting for 11 years.

So unless you compete in the Olympic level or play professional sports you’re probably not close to being advanced.

You can stand to add some more strength to your foundation. If this is the case make sure to follow this type of warm up before performing heavy sets of your compound exercise.

Barbell Warm UP for Bench Press

250lbs 3 RepMax

Barbell – 5 reps

95 lbs – 5 reps

115 lbs – 3 reps

135 lbs – 3 reps

185 lbs – 3 reps

225 lbs – 1 rep

245 lbs – 1 rep

250 lbs – 3 reps

So as you can see from the example above you want to keep your reps low while increasing the weight in increments comfortable for you.

If you feel like you need a little more warm up on a certain day then add a couple of more sets into the warm up. Just remember to keep the reps low. 

Also, this warm up is not set in stone. You HAVE to tailor it to your specific needs.

Try it out and see what works for you.

If you have any questions drop them in the comment section below.

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